The fig tree, the Asvatha of the Hindus, was reverenced and used as a symbol of the universe by the Hindus as well as by Buddhists. It is seen in the Hindu Vedic Hymns (See the Collation of Theosophical Society's Glossaries, and Max Muller's The Sacred Books of the East) and in the Buddhist work the Dhammapadda, for example. The Fig Tree, like the Star of David was assimilated by Judaism from the Hindus and was used as a symbol of the universe and as a symbol of Judaism itself.
Constantly referring to vegetarian Old Testament prophets, Jesus was doing the same in the short episode of cursing the fig tree by alluding to Jeremiah, chapter 24, wherein Jeremiah has a vision in which God shows him two baskets of figs, one good, and one bad. God blesses the figs of the poor Hebrews about to be exiled; in chapter 29 God tells them through Jeremiah to grow gardens and eat produce, be vegetarian, even in exile. These vegetarians, encouraged not to fall to the heathen gods, but to remain vegetarian, are the good figs, and they are in sharp contrast to the bad figs, the partakers of animal sacrifices, Zedekiah, the king of Judah, his princes, and their following in Jerusalem, location of the Temple where animals were sacrificed.
When Jesus curses the fig tree, he is cursing an orthodox Judaism that is elitist, the enslaves people, and that sacrifices animals. Jeremiah had done the same towards the elitist Jews who also sacrificed animals, as can be seen in the scriptures below.
Jesus parallels the evils
of the past Jewish orthodoxy with the evils of the present orthodoxy that
he confronts. But this is hardly a mystery of the Bible that our
orthodoxies, who have traditionally profited from corpse eating and slaughterhouses,
want solved.
From "Jeremiah"
"Like these good figs, so I will regard as good the exiles from Judah, whom I have sent away from this place to the land of the Chaldeans....I will plant them and not uproot them. I will give them a heart to know that I am the Lord; and they shall be my people and I will be their God, for they shall return to me with their whole heart. 24: 5-7.So, to Jeremiah the good figs represent the world or universe of pure Judaism. The bad figs are those who have corrupted this world with animal sacrifices and human elitism. So too Jesus withered the Fig Tree because it was a symbol of a corrupted Judaism, a Judaism of animal sacrifices, slavery, and social elitism in general...."Like the bad figs which are so bad they cannot be eaten, so will I treat Zedekiah the king of Judah, his princes, the remnant in Jerusalem who remain in this land, and those who dwell in the land of Egypt. I will make them a horror to all the kingdoms of the earth... 24: 8-9.
God Commands Vegetarianism:
"Plant gardens and eat their produce."
And God through Jeremiah commands that the Israelites in exile plant gardens and eat vegetation, and thereby stay true to the original vegetarian covenant.
"Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, to all the exiles whom I have sent into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon: Build houses and live in them; plant gardens and eat their produce." 29: 4-5.Reiterating the theme of justice and karma, that the hunter will become the hunted, Jeremiah also links the carcasses of flesh, i.e. animal sacrifices, with idols."...build houses and live in them, and plant gardens and eat their produce. 29: 28."
Juxtapose the above scriptures with the following passages from "Jeremiah:"
"And I brought you into a plentiful land to enjoy its fruits and its good things. But when you came in you defiled my land, and made my heritage an abomination. The priests did not say, "Where is the Lord?" Those who handle the law did not know me; the rulers transgressed against me; the prophets prophesied by Ba'al, and went after things that do not profit. 2: 7-8.
"Your burnt offerings are not acceptable, nor your sacrifices pleasing to me. 6: 20. "Therefore do not pray for this people, or lift up a cry or prayer on their behalf, for I will not listen when they call to me in the time of their trouble. What right has my beloved in my house, when she has done vile deeds. Can vows and sacrificial flesh avert your doom? Can you then exult?" 11: 14-15.
"Behold I am sending for many fishers, says the Lord, and they shall catch them; and afterwards I will send for many hunters, and they shall hunt them....And I will doubly recompense their iniquity and their sin, because they have polluted my land with the carcasses of their detestable idols, and have filled my inheritance with their abominations." 16: 16-18.It is also quite clear that in "Lamentations" Jeremiah sees the animal sacrifices of the priests as evil. In 4: 14 the priests are portrayed as so consumed with their brutality and bloodshed that they walk blind through the streets, and since they have been butchering the bodies of the sacrificed animals, they are "so defiled with blood that none could touch their garments."
The Lord gave full vent to his wrath, he poured out his hot anger; and he kindled a fire in Zion, which consumed its foundations. 4: 11.This was for the sins of her prophets and the iniquities of her priests, who shed in the midst of her the blood of the righteous. 4: 13.
They wandered, blind, through the streets, so defiled with blood that none could touch their garments. 4: 14.